Law enforcement officers are often faced with the task of pursuing suspects in vehicles. Numerous apparatus and methods for stopping fleeing vehicles have been disclosed in the prior art.
One method used in the prior art deploys various types of spike belts to puncture the tires of a vehicle, as in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,330,285, 5,536,109, and 6,048,128.
Another method used in the prior art delivers an electrical pulse to the engine of the fleeing vehicle. The electrical pulse can be provided either from a pursuing police car or from a fixed position along the road, as disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,619,231, 4,976,862, and 5,503,059.
A further method disclosed in the prior art requires that all vehicles be equipped with some form of receiver and engine shut off device, so that a police officer could disable the vehicle by remote transmission. Such systems are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,619,231, and 6,135,226.
An additional method for stopping a vehicle is to mount some sort of grappling apparatus to the front of a police car. The apparatus is designed to engage the bumper or undercarriage of the fleeing vehicle. One such system is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,839,759.